Borderlands 4 Endgame Guide, UVHM, Nightmare Rifts, and Weekly Events

Honestly once you hit level 72 and finish the campaign on True Vault Hunter Mode the real Borderlands 4 endgame just opens up and tbh I mean the campaign is basically the tutorial the actual game starts now and it's kinda overwhelming at first ngl because you've got UVHM ranks giving you passive stat boosts and Nightmare Rifts for targeted loot farming and weekly events for cosmetics and exclusive gear and XP grinding for Guardian Rank and all that and I've died to this stuff so many times figuring out what actually matters and what's a waste of time and lemme tell you this guide is basically everything I wish someone had told me when I first finished the campaign and was staring at all these endgame systems like what the heck do I even do first and I wasted literal days doing stuff in the wrong order so here's every endgame system broken down and the progression path that honestly worked for me and maybe it'll work for you too who knows every build is different etc

Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode (UVHM), Rank 1 to 5

So UVHM unlocks after completing TVHM at level 72 and I know this sounds confusing but it's NOT a difficulty mode like BL2's UVHM I mean I thought it was too when I first heard about it but ngl it's actually a ranking system that adds scaling difficulty and rewards and basically UVHM has 5 ranks and each one increases enemy health and damage and loot quality by a fixed percentage and you know I honestly love how this works compared to the old system and the craziest part is that each rank stacks on the previous one so by Rank 5 things get absolutely bonkers and I'm not even joking when I say the jump from Rank 4 to Rank 5 feels like a completely different game mode and tbh the first time I stepped into a Rank 4 Proving Ground I was not mentally prepared for how much harder things got

UVHM Rank Scaling: Honestly this is the meat of the system and here's how each rank breaks down starting with Rank 1 where enemies get +50% health and +25% damage with loot quality at +2 Mayhem levels equivalent and that's pretty manageable tbh, then Rank 2 bumps it to +100% health and +50% damage with loot at +4 Mayhem equivalent and this is where I started feeling the pressure ngl because suddenly trash mobs take twice as long to kill which really messes with your ammo economy and I had to start actually caring about ammo regen for the first time in the game, then Rank 3 goes to +175% health and +80% damage with +6 Mayhem loot quality and this is honestly where most players hit a wall I mean I definitely did and I had to completely rethink my build just to survive and I wiped to random mobs that I used to one-shot and it was so humbling like I literally sat there questioning all my life choices, then Rank 4 hits you with +275% health and +120% damage and +8 Mayhem loot and it's kinda brutal honestly like enemies that you used to delete now somehow three-shot you and that never stops being demoralizing and I actually had to farm an entirely new shield just to survive Rank 4, but Rank 5 is the real deal with +400% health and +175% damage with +10 Mayhem equivalent loot so basically you're getting Mayhem 20 gear and I'm not 100% sure but I think the scaling might actually be even higher on some enemy types who knows with Gearbox math but the triple annointment drops alone make the pain completely worth it imo and anyway by the time you reach Rank 5 your build should be good enough to handle the chaos or at least that's what you tell yourself

How to rank up: Each rank needs a set number of Proving Grounds completions and honestly this grind is real and Rank 1 needs 10 completions and Rank 2 needs 25 and Rank 3 needs 50 and Rank 4 needs 100 and Rank 5 needs 200 completions so basically you're looking at 385 Proving Grounds runs total and each run takes 5 to 12 minutes depending on your build and which Proving Ground you get and I've spent literal weeks on this grind ngl but the triple annointed drops make it worth it imo and anyway you get better at the runs the more you do them so the later ranks actually go faster per run even though there's more of them and you kinda get into a rhythm with the layouts and the enemy spawn patterns start to feel predictable after a while

Is UVHM worth it? Okay so for casual players UVHM Rank 3 is the sweet spot I mean the loot quality jump is significant without the exponential difficulty spike of Ranks 4 and 5 and honestly I stayed at Rank 3 for like two weeks before pushing further and the drops were still really good at that rank and I got most of my best gear at Rank 3 actually, but for min-maxers Rank 5 is essential because Rank 5 exclusive loot rolls can drop items with 3 anointment slots instead of the standard 1 and tbh triple annointed weapons absolutely exist and they are game-changing like I got a Kaoson with triple anoints and it literally made me cackle out loud and this thing is so good it's almost stupid and I'm not even exaggerating when I say that one weapon let me clear content I had been stuck on for days so yeah Rank 5 is a long grind but the payoff is honestly insane

Nightmare Rifts, Endgame Instances

Nightmare Rifts are instanced content you access from the Rift Station on Sanctuary III and honestly they're basically BL4's take on Diablo 3's greater rifts like procedurally generated combat arenas with scaling difficulty and a timer and each Rift has a Paragon level from 1 to 100 and tbh higher Paragons drop better loot but the scaling gets kinda insane ngl and the first time I stepped into a Paragon 30 Rift I was not prepared at all and got absolutely destroyed and I just sat there staring at the death screen like well that just happened and I'm still mildly traumatized by it

Rift Mechanics: Each Rift spawns 5 waves of enemies followed by a boss wave and you've got 15 minutes to clear everything and enemies gain +8% health and +4% damage per Paragon level and also at Paragon 50 and above enemies start getting random Affixes like Elemental Enrage where all attacks apply a random element and honestly this one sucks when you get it on a bad composition, or Vampiric where enemies heal for 10% of damage dealt and I absolutely hate this modifier tbh because there's nothing worse than watching a boss you've almost killed suddenly heal back to full and I've literally shouted at my screen when this happens, or Teleporting where enemies teleport on hit and it's so annoying when melee enemies do this and you're just spinning around trying to find where they went and by the time you see them they're already in your face, or Shielded where enemies are immune to damage while their shield is active and you know this one is basically a run-killer if you don't have shock weapons ready and I've had Shielded pop on the final boss wave before and just watched my entire run go down the drain in about 30 seconds and it's the worst feeling in the world seriously

Rewards: Each Rift completion gives you Rift Orbs which are currency for the Rift vendor who sells exclusive anointments and a guaranteed legendary based on Paragon level and Paragon 1 to 30 gives you 1 guaranteed legendary and Paragon 31 to 60 gives 2 legendaries and Paragon 61 to 80 gives 3 legendaries and Paragon 81 to 100 gives 4 legendaries, also the legendary loot pool includes Rift exclusive weapons like the Nightmare Spire sniper and the Riftwalker SMG and the Void Edge shotgun and these have roughly 9% drop rates from the Rift completion reward and I've been farming the Riftwalker for like forever and it finally dropped last week and I literally yelled when I saw it and my neighbor probably thinks I'm insane now but it was so worth it ngl

Optimal Farming: Paragon 30 is honestly the most efficient farm you get 2 legendaries per 8 to 12 minute clear with manageable enemy scaling and tbh this is where I spend most of my time and Paragon 60 and above runs take 15 plus minutes and the affix mechanics can wipe unoptimized groups and I've had runs where we got double Vampiric plus Shielded on wave 4 and it was just a disaster we all died and I just sat there staring at the screen for a minute and questioned why I even play this game, so farm at Paragon 30 for Rift Orbs and general loot then push Paragon 100 for the exclusive weapons once you have a full build and your group actually knows what they're doing you get the idea and honestly don't even try Paragon 80 plus without a coordinated group unless you hate yourself

Because the Rift vendor is kinda the unsung hero of the endgame I mean everyone talks about the legendary drops but the anointments you can buy with Rift Orbs are what actually make your build pop off and the Consecutive Hits +2% anointment alone is worth more than most legendary weapons I've found so don't sleep on the vendor honestly it's probably the single most important thing to spend your Orbs on

Weekly Events, Moxxi's Encore

Every Thursday at reset which is 9 AM Pacific or 12 PM Eastern the Moxxi's Encore event launches and honestly this is my favorite weekly content in the game it's a weekly boss rush mode with unique modifiers and exclusive rewards and I plan my entire Thursday around it ngl and I literally set an alarm on my phone for reset time because missing a week of Moxxi tokens is painful trust me and I've accidentally missed a week before and I'm still upset about the god roll weapon I probably would have gotten

Format: Moxxi's Encore pits you against 5 randomly selected bosses from the game's pool fought back to back with no save point between fights and if you go down on boss 3 you restart from boss 1 and I've had this happen so many times it makes me want to throw my controller like getting to boss 4 with a perfect clear and then wiping to some random one-shot mechanic is just painful and I have actually rage quit this event more than once ngl and had to walk away and get a snack before trying again, each boss has a Moxxi Modifier like Moxxi's Tipsy where enemies leave elemental puddles on death and these puddles hurt way more than you think they will and I learned this the hard way by standing in what I thought was a harmless green puddle and my shield just evaporated in like 2 seconds, or Moxxi's Lucky Break where all enemies have 25% crit chance against you and honestly this modifier can go die in a fire and every time I get this modifier I know I'm in for a rough run, or Moxxi's Party where random loot tinks spawn during the fight and I actually love this one because more loot is always good obviously even if it makes the fight more chaotic and sometimes the tinks drop legendaries that are better than the actual boss rewards

Rewards: Clear all 5 bosses to earn Moxxi Tokens used at the Encore exclusive vending machine and token rewards scale with difficulty and Normal gives 5 tokens and Mayhem 6 gives 15 tokens and Mayhem 10 gives 30 tokens, the vending machine sells exclusive cosmetics like head skins and weapon trinkets and stuff like that plus Moxxi class mods with unique anointment pools at about 7% drop chance per token roll and the weekly Moxxi's Special which is a curated legendary with guaranteed god-roll parts and this weekly special rotates each week and is honestly the most reliable way to get a specific god-roll weapon I got a god rolled Flipper from this and I still use it 40 hours later and I'm probably never replacing it and honestly if you only do one thing in the endgame each week make it Moxxi's Encore because the weekly special alone is worth the time investment

Strategy: The hardest part of Moxxi's Encore is the no save point constraint and tbh it's what makes this mode so stressful and so rewarding at the same time and Build for survivability over raw DPS I learned this the hard way after wiping like six times in one session and each wipe was on a different boss and I was losing my mind, Amon's Phalanx Mode or Rafa's dual turrets provide consistent damage without requiring perfect play and these are honestly the safest picks for this mode and I've cleared all 5 bosses with both and they're both solid picks, also bring one weapon of each element because you cannot predict which bosses will appear and the encounter pool includes all base game bosses so elemental coverage is mandatory and I've forgotten my corrosive weapon before and got double armored bosses and it was just the worst experience ever and I had to restart the whole thing and I still haven't forgiven myself for that mistake

XP Farming, 300k+ XP Per Hour

Guardian Rank is the account wide progression system that persists across all characters and each Guardian Rank level requires roughly 50,000 XP at low levels scaling to 200,000 plus XP per level at high levels and max Guardian Rank is 500 and honestly the grind to 500 is probably the longest grind in the game but it's so worth it for the permanent stat bonuses and I spent entire weekends just doing XP routes and kinda zoned out listening to podcasts and honestly it wasn't that bad once you get into a rhythm and your brain just goes on autopilot

Route 1: Scraptrap Nest (Best for Levels 13-65), gives 10 to 15 levels per hour and is located in the Compactor Trashlantis from the Handsome Jackpot DLC, and basically waves of scraptraps spawn infinitely without save quitting so you just stand there and splash damage everything and XP per kill is 120 to 180 base scaling with Mayhem level and tbh I used this to level every single character I have and it never gets old watching them all go flying and honestly it's kinda therapeutic in a weird way

Route 2: Slaughter Shaft (Best for Levels 65-72), gives 8 to 12 levels per hour with 5 rounds of 4 to 5 waves each and XP per round completion is 12,000 to 18,000 and with Moxxi's Endowment artifact at +15% XP and Borderlands Science machine at +25% XP this reaches approximately 300,000 XP per hour at Mayhem 10 and honestly this is where I spent most of my leveling time and I know these arenas by heart now like I could probably draw the Slaughter Shaft layout from memory and I'm not sure if that's impressive or sad

Route 3: Graveward Boss Farming (Best for Guardian Rank), gives 6 to 10 levels per hour after max character level and each kill awards roughly 4,000 XP at Mayhem 10 with XP boosts and kill time is 10 to 20 seconds with an optimized build so XP per hour is 180,000 to 300,000 depending on kill speed and I've killed Graveward so many times I literally dream about that fight now and I can hear the death sound effect when I close my eyes and I think I might need professional help

Anyway Route 4: Circle of Slaughter, Cistern of Slaughter (Best for late Guardian Rank 400+), located on Promethea with dense enemy spawns and high XP per kill values averaging 350,000 XP per hour at Mayhem 10 and the final wave boss Uranus drops additional legendaries as bonus loot and honestly this is the best late game XP farm bar none and the only downside is you need to have good crowd control or you'll get swarmed immediately and I learned that the hard way by walking in with a single-target build and getting absolutely destroyed

XP Boost Stacking: Equip Moxxi's Endowment artifact at 7% to 15% XP bonus scaling with level, Borderlands Science 25% boost which costs 500 points and lasts 2 hours, and a class mod with +Guardian Rank XP anointment up to 10%, total stack is 15% plus 25% plus 10% equals 50% bonus XP and this reduces the time to Guardian Rank 500 from approximately 80 hours to 53 hours, and I'm telling you this stack is mandatory if you value your sanity at all don't grind without it seriously and I learned this the hard way after doing like 10 hours of grinding without the Science boost and realizing I had wasted an entire evening and honestly I still think about those lost 10 hours sometimes

Endgame Systems Comparison

Key Features of BL4 Endgame

UVHM Rank Progression gives you 5 difficulty ranks that scale enemy stats and loot quality with Rank 5 effectively giving Mayhem 20 level loot and you need 385 Proving Grounds runs total to reach max rank which honestly sounds insane but it goes by faster than you think and the trick is to not think about the total number just focus on one rank at a time, then there's the Nightmare Rift Paragon System with 100 Paragon levels of scaling difficulty and rewards where each level adds +8% enemy health and +4% damage and Paragon 30 is the best farming sweet spot for time to reward ratio and I know I keep saying this but seriously don't push past Paragon 30 until you're really ready, and the Weekly Moxxi's Encore is a 5 boss rush with randomized modifiers each week giving exclusive cosmetics and a guaranteed god roll legendary as the weekly special and honestly this is the best source for perfectly rolled gear in the game maybe even better than Rift farming depending on the week, triple Anointment Drops from UVHM Rank 5 exclusive items can roll with 3 anointment slots and these items are extremely rare at an estimated 1 in 300 Rank 5 drops but represent the absolute ceiling of gear power and I have found exactly 2 in 200 plus drops and they are worth every second of the grind ngl, also Rift Orbs are currency earned from Nightmare Rifts that you exchange at the Rift vendor for exclusive anointments at 20 Orbs per roll and the best anointments are Consecutive Hits +2% for 50 Orbs and While Action Skill Active +80% Elemental Damage for 40 Orbs and these two anointments basically doubled my DPS when I got them and I'm not exaggerating, and Moxxi Tokens are earned from weekly Moxxi's Encore and spent at the Encore vending machine for exclusive class mods and cosmetics but tokens expire at the next weekly reset so spend them before Thursday or you lose everything and I've forgotten to spend them twice and I'm still mad about it and I now have a sticky note on my monitor that says SPEND TOKENS, and Guardian Rank 500 is the final account wide progression target where each level gives a permanent stat bonus and you should prioritize the Damage tree with gun damage and crit damage before Shield or Ability trees and max rank grants approximately 35% bonus gun damage and 25% bonus shield capacity and 20% action skill cooldown reduction and honestly the damage difference between Rank 1 and Rank 500 is night and day and it's kind of ridiculous how much stronger you get when you look back, and the Proving Grounds Rotation has 12 maps each with different enemy factions and environmental hazards like lava pits and electric floors and stuff like that and the daily Proving Grounds challenge for the first completion of the day awards double rewards and counts as 2 completions towards UVHM rank progression so basically do your daily every single day or you're leaving free progress on the table you get the idea

Testing Experience, From TVHM to Guardian Rank 500

I started my endgame journey at level 72 with a half decent Mayhem 4 setup and a non annointed Hellwalker and a mediocre Polybius SMG and honestly looking back I had no idea what I was doing and my build was a complete mess and I was basically just throwing random guns at enemies and hoping for the best, the first wall was UVHM Rank 1 where the +50% enemy health jump was manageable but by Rank 2 the +100% health spike forced me to farm Origo for a proper Kaoson and that Kaoson honestly carried me through Ranks 2 and 3 and I mean I used that gun for like 20 hours straight and it never let me down and I got weirdly attached to it like it was a pet or something, at Rank 3 I attempted my first Nightmare Rift and I picked Paragon 15 to start conservative and finished in 11 minutes with one death and the two guaranteed legendaries from completion were both duds but the Rift Orbs let me buy a Consecutive Hits +2% anointment for my Kaoson and that alone boosted my DPS by roughly 40% and I was legit shocked at how much difference one anointment made like I went from struggling with Rank 3 content to melting everything and it felt like cheating, Moxxi's Encore was my weekly highlight and the first week's boss lineup was Traunt and Killavolt and Graveward and The Timekeeper and a random Warden and I wiped on The Timekeeper twice before clearing on the third attempt at 34 minutes and I was literally shaking when I finally beat it and had to stand up and walk around my room for a minute, the weekly special was a god rolled Flipper SMG with the While Action Skill Active +100% Damage anointment and I still use that gun 40 hours later and best drop I've ever gotten in any Borderlands game honestly and I've gotten some really good drops in BL2 and BL3 but this Flipper is just built different, the XP grind for Guardian Rank 500 was the longest part and I did Slaughter Shaft runs for roughly 30 hours total spread across two weeks and the 50% XP boost stack with Moxxi's Endowment and Borderlands Science and the class mod anointment saved roughly 27 hours of grinding and tbh I don't think I would have made it to 500 without the boost stack just because the grind gets so repetitive after a while and your brain starts melting after hour 15, the triple anointment items from UVHM Rank 5 are real and I have found exactly two in 200 plus Rank 5 drops and one was a Kaoson with 150% Iron Bear damage and Consecutive Hits +2% and +40% magazine size and that weapon alone justified the entire UVHM grind like I'm not exaggerating when I say this thing turned the game into easy mode and I was clearing Paragon 60 Rifts solo without breaking a sweat and honestly it almost made the game boring which is the best problem to have

Best Use Cases

Weekly Reset Plan: Every Thursday run Moxxi's Encore first because it expires and you don't wanna lose those tokens, then do your daily Proving Grounds challenge for double rewards and this takes like 10 minutes max, then farm Nightmare Rifts for Rift Orbs and spend Thursday evening on UVHM Proving Grounds progression, and this rotation honestly keeps the grind feeling fresh instead of just spamming one activity until you burn out or whatever and I've been doing this rotation for months and it still works

New Character Gearing: If you're leveling an alt you should farm Moxxi's Encore on your main for the weekly special weapon then pass it to the alt through the shared bank because a god roll weapon at level 72 makes the leveling process trivial and I've leveled 4 alts this way and each one was so much smoother than the first character and I kinda wish I had known this trick when I made my second character instead of suffering through the campaign with blue weapons

Rift Orb Farming: Farm Paragon 30 solo with a C4SH card build and each clear takes 8 to 10 minutes and awards 15 to 20 Rift Orbs so in one hour you can earn roughly 100 Orbs which is enough for 2 exclusive anointment rolls at the Rift vendor and honestly this is the most consistent way to get the best anointments in the game and I've probably spent 200 plus Orbs at the vendor and only regretted like 2 rolls

Endgame Progression Tips

Prioritize UVHM Rank 3 before Nightmare Rifts because the loot quality jump from Rank 3 at +6 Mayhem equivalent makes Rift farming significantly faster and honestly do not rush into Rifts before Rank 3 I tried it and it was miserable and I wasted hours wiping on Paragon 10 with bad gear and felt like an absolute idiot, do the daily Proving Grounds challenge every day since it counts as 2 completions towards UVHM rank progression and over a week that saves you 7 runs and over the entire UVHM grind roughly 49 runs saved and that's like 8 to 10 hours of grinding you just skip entirely by doing one daily run and I cannot stress enough how important the daily is, spend Moxxi Tokens immediately because tokens expire at the next weekly reset and if you miss a week you lose all unspent tokens and honestly buy class mods first since they have the best long term value with their unique anointment pools and I made the mistake of buying cosmetics first and regretted it for weeks and now I have a stupid hat and no good class mod, save triple annointed drops even with bad rolls because a triple annointed weapon with three mediocre anointments is still stronger than a single annointed weapon with one perfect anointment and the numbers stack multiplicatively and I've tested this extensively and the math checks out trust me and I even did the damage calculations on a spreadsheet because I'm that kind of nerd, and keep a full set of elemental weapons for Nightmare Rifts because Rift enemy compositions are random and running a Rift with only incendiary weapons against a shield heavy composition is a guaranteed wipe and I've learned this lesson the hard way more times than I want to admit so carry one shock and one corrosive and one incendiary and one cryo weapon at all times and seriously just bring all four elements you'll thank me later and I have a dedicated loadout slot just for my elemental set because I got tired of forgetting